Imperial Army of the Holy Roman Emperor
Accordingly, the Imperial Army was a force established by the Emperor, with privileges in the whole of the Holy Roman Empire.
The Emperor was not permitted to raise troops in the electoral states, but had inter alia the right to recruit soldiers in the imperial cities and in all other territories.
During the Imperial interregnum of 1740-1742, Habsburg troops no longer formed the army for the Emperor, but that of the Queen of Hungary.
With the acquisition of the crown by Charles VII of the Bavarian House of Wittelsbach, units from the Electorate of Bavaria formed the Imperial Army for a short time, from 1742 to 1745.
A year after the loss of the imperial crown, the Archduchess of Austria and Queen of Hungary directed her troops to wear green instead of gold for officers' sashes and for the regimental flags.
[3] Prussian and Protestant journalists increasingly lost interest in a universal Reich concept, which, for a long time, had earned the imperial troops their special position.
Even Maria Theresa's son, Emperor Joseph II, with his centralizing reforms that promoted an Austrian territorial state, encouraged Imperial politics less and less.
The annual average strengths of the Emperor's military forces throughout mid 17th to early 18th century are as follows:[5] The Habsburgs were infrequently successful at convincing the rest of the Empire to shoulder the burden of the army.
